Dragons and Eagles
by The Projective Otaku
Summary: Rukia thinks she has found a way to fix Ichigo's honor complex through something that he hates - school activities, and Asuna thinks she had found a way to finally cheer up Kirito. Little do they know that their stories will be intertwined and thrown into a crucible that will consume entire nations...
1. Samurais and Soldiers

Dragons and Eagles

Chapter 1

Samurais and Soldiers

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**Ok, so this isn't quite a total AU and it isn't quite Vanilla, it's happening in the timeframe of SAO, so Bleach is happening twenty or so years late. SAO is Pre-GGO, Post-ALO and Bleach is almost at the beginning of the series, before they go to the Soul Society. OC will get here later.**

**Rukia kind of bashes on the Japanese Self Defense Force in here, and I'd just like to say that I harbor no grudge or resentment against the JSDF, quite the contrary, I believe that they are a sharper spear than the US Military at this point (because China and N. Korea are on their doorstep), and they'll show it later on in the story. I just do it for storyline purposes**

* * *

Ichigo brought his sword in a downward arc, screaming in frustration. The minotaur-scorpion hollow he was fighting jumped nimbly away once again as one of its two barbed tails lashed out like lightning, opening up a scratch on Ichigo's arm, right through his Shinigami robe. He jumped back out of the hollow's reach, panting. He hadn't even known his soul could sweat, but it was pouring off of him now. This was his seventh hollow and it was shaping up to be a far more formidable opponent than the others had been.

He jumped right as it came back at him, slamming a claw-hand into the ground, sending dust and rocks in all directions. In mid-air, Ichigo brought his zanpaku-to around in a horizontal swing that severed the hollow's left arm at the shoulder. The hollow let out a horrifying screech before skittering back itself. Ichigo stood his ground. His lungs and throat burned with a cold fire and his muscles felt as if they might give out at any moment.

"What the hell are you doing Ichigo?! Get your ass in the game!" Rukia yelled from beside a tree a few meters away, her usual disdainful look upon her face. The cool night breeze through the park stirring her skirt and hair, giving her an even more dramatic appearance.

"He's wounded, it wouldn't be right to attack him until he's good and ready." Ichigo replied, turning to her and away from the hollow. What he was really doing was catching his breath, but he would be damned if he was going to let Rukia know that.

"How many times do I have to say it to get it through your thick skull?! Save bushido for the Kendo rink! This is war! You can't-" Ichigo didn't hear the rest of her rant, the pain emanating from his abdomen seemed to block out all senses. He coughed up blood and managed to look down somehow. Protruding from his robe was the large, sharp upper half of the hollow's claw. Ichigo heard an evil laugh from behind him.

"You are strong child, but your inexperience betrays you, and now your soul will be mine." A deep, menacing voice said. 'My god how cliché can you be?' was the thought going through the back of Ichigo's mind, but his famous temper clouded the rest of it. It completely smothered his pain and he simply became pissed off. He brought his sword up under his left arm and rammed it through the hollow's head, allowing the hollow to dissipate. Ichigo fell to his knees and then his back.

"Ichigo! Ichigo! Come on, I don't want to have to drag your sor-" and Ichigo blacked out.

* * *

Ichigo opened his eyes with a startled gasp, rays of light shined over his head through the window. Window? Window. He looked over. The realization that it was his window in his room came slowly through his muddled thoughts. Where was he last? The park. He was at the park, fighting a hollow. He sat up in bed, letting the sheets fall down to reveal gauze wrappings around his abdomen. Where had those come from? He heard the door open and looked over, sill in a daze.

"You're awake now? Good." Rukia said from the doorway before striding over to his bedside and delivering an epic backhand across his face. "That wouldn't have been nearly as satisfying if you were unconscious."

"Wha-What the fuck!" He yelled, fully awake now.

"What was that?!" they heard from downstairs, through the open door.

"Uhhh… Nothing!" Ichigo yelled back to his youngest sister, who wasn't particularly fond of his new high school vocabulary. Rukia smirked. The boy hadn't balked or shown any fear in facing her, a Shinigami, or the horrid, deformed creatures known as hollows, but he was afraid of his little sister. After a few moments and it became apparent that said sister wasn't coming upstairs to administer punishment with her wooden spoon, Ichigo looked back to Rukia.

"But really, what was that for?"

"That was for doing something incredibly stupid to get wounded almost beyond my capability to heal you AND making me drag your heavy butt halfway across the city to get you back to your body." Rukia said with a mildly annoyed expression. Ichigo really wanted to say that he was just using that as an excuse to catch his breath but if Rukia found out about it her vengeful nature would never let him live it down. He grunted in acknowledgement.

"And that's just the beginning of your punishment." She reached into her schoolbag as Ichigo looked at her quizzically and pulled out a pamphlet, "You missed the summer camp fair today and I found one that might help crush that idea of honor for you." She put the pamphlet more or less on his face and he had to snatch it from her.

"Rukia, I've told you before, I don't do summer camps." He said stubbornly.

"I know, that just makes it a bonus punishment." She said with her best 'I'm a fifteen year old schoolgirl not a one hundred and fifty year old Shinigami' smile. He snorted and read over the pamphlet.

"What is this? A military camp? It's not even Japanese! It's run by the American exchange student! And we have to go all the way to _Okinawa_! Are you crazy?" He said in his well-practiced complaining voice.

"Yes, a military camp, you need to learn how to be a merciless soldier instead of an honor-bound samurai, because the hollows will not follow some abstract code of honor and will take advantage of anyone who does. And what if it is American? Everything I've read since I came to this world says that America has the best military on this plane, and they've been fighting a steady stream of wars and conflicts for the past eighty years. Your country hasn't fought even one war in that time period and the last war you had, against the Americans I might add, you lost miserably. And as for Okinawa, it isn't that far, only a few hours away by one of those airplane contraptions you humans use so much." Rukia said in a stern tone.

"Yea the Americans might have a better military, but they're pompous assholes! And as for the whole honor thing, this is run by a _student_, not a soldier. It's probably just an otaku camp filled with nerds!" Rukia nodded solemnly and reached into her backpack and pulled out a tablet that Ichigo hadn't seen before and handed it to him.

"I figured you might say that. You know how he sits in the back of the class and writes all day? Well, I…. liberated this from him so that you could read what he writes. It may not be completely accurate, but it does have the right… air about, I suppose. Also, he isn't a foreign exchange student, his father is an American sailor stationed at Yokota Air Base, and he lives out here in town, so this is his school."

"A sailor? Why isn't he at the naval base they have over on the other side of Tokyo?"

"No idea, but the point is his pedigree. He comes from a military family, and from his writing, he obviously has a certain amount of knowledge on war and soldiering." Ichigo growled slightly and powered up the tablet.

"I'll be the judge of that."

* * *

"What?! You're actually going to a camp this year!" Keigo said the next day in class, tears streaming down his face, "I can finally have a normal summer at a summer camp with all my friends."

"That makes you sound like a stalker, Asano-san." Mizuiro said, listening to his iPhone.

"That's cruel man, don't be like that, you know my parents make me go to a camp every summer with a bunch of people I don't know." Keigo said, "Anyway, Kurosaki, what camp are you going to?" Ichigo mumbled something under his breath "What was that?" Ichigo mumbled a little louder, but still not loud enough to be understood. "Huh? Still can't hear you." Keigo said, cupping his ear in front of Ichigo's face.

"I said I'm going to the god damned military camp, kapisch?!" Ichigo yelled at him in frustration. Keigo stumbled back and fell over a desk to the entertainment of what students were present at the moment. When he came back up he had a dark and foreboding look.

"The military camp? The one where The American takes you down to the islands for a month and runs you until you die? That military camp?"

"Don't say that to me, Rukia signed me up for it." Ichigo said, gesturing to the girl in the desk beside him.

"Why whatever do you mean Kurosaki-kun? For what reason would I ever register you for something as crude and dirty as a military camp?" She said, putting a hand under her chin and putting on a very effective innocent look.

"Well, however you got signed up for it, it sounds fun," The hulking Chad said from the side of the group, "maybe I should go too…" He added on to himself.

"That's easy for you to say you hulking brute!" Keigo said "You have muscle mass and endurance to spare! Then look at me! I'm a skinny Japanese boy who doesn't even play a sport, I'll get murdered!"

"Oh, come off it Keigo, weren't you the one crying about how you were finally going to get to go to summer camp with your friends?" Mizuiro said, "Besides, now that Chad is going, I might as well go to, and that would mean the whole gang is going!" He leaned in closer, "Besides, you can't sign someone else up for a camp unless you sign up yourself, which means Rukia-chan is going too, eh?" He whispered. Keigo immediately jumped up.

"Very well then, I will go and support my friends in their struggles, as is my solemn duty!" He said, all trace of despair gone from his voice and demeanor. Everyone in the group, except the stoic Chad, gave him a wry look. Across the room, Orihime watched the exchange.

"Kurosaki-san is going to a camp this year?" The air-headed girl asked out loud.

"What? He is?" Her best friend, Tatsumi, said from her other side. "Well I guess there's a first time for everything. Orihime continued to stare off at the group of boys. "Wait, you're not thinking about going, are you?" Orihime turned around and her face heated.

"Wha-no, no of course not…" She said, looking down,

"Ha! You are! Honestly Orihime, you can't lie worth a damn." Tatsumi said with a victorious look, "Well I guess there's no helping it, I'll just have to go to."

"You will Tatsumi?! Oh, thank you!" Orihime said, hugging the other girl.

"Hey, hey let go, what's with this hugging phase all of a sudden?" Orihime let go, slightly chastised, "What camp is it anyway?"

* * *

"A military camp?" Kazuto asked. Both he and Asuna were in their usual lunch spot, the bench underneath the awning in the courtyard, when Asuna had brought it up.

"Yea, a military camp, your rehabilitation hasn't been going the way you want it, so I thought a physical summer camp could get you out of the house over the summer." Asuna replied.

"But I could just go to some gym camp or something so I could stay here. Besides, the schedule for this thing is packed, there won't be any time to go visit Yui." Kazuto said

"I've got just the thing for that." Asuna said, reaching into her backpack and pulling out a round disk-like device about the size of her hand. It was white and two thirds up started to curve down blue rather than up white. Asuna pressed a button on its side and the blue third lit up and a small girl appeared in shades of blue on top.

"Ugghhh, wha-, Daddy? Mommy? It worked! Mommy it worked!" Yui said from the top of the small disk.

"Where on earth did you get a holographic projector?" Kazuto asked.

"Well, an old friend of mine runs the camp, so when I mentioned Yui in a letter, he made this. It hooks up directly to the Seed so Yui can come to our world." Asuna said.

"It's not the same as you guys coming over to this side, but at least we can talk!" Yui added on. Kazuto laughed a little.

"Yea, Yui, I guess we can. But I still don't see why I need to go off to Okinawa to go to a camp with this much hassle when I can stay here and go to a far less hectic camp." Asuna face fell just a little before she responded.

"Well, you've been seeming kind of down lately, I figured that going someplace with a lot of activity and friends might help out a little, Kirito." Asuna said.

"My name out here is Kazuto, Asuna."

"I know, but I want to be with Kirito; happy, dedicated, friendly. Kazuto is depressed and sad. I want Kazuto and Kirito to be the same person." She said, grabbing his hand.

"Yea… I guess." Kirito said, pulling his hand from Asuna and putting it over her shoulder, pulling her close. Asuna made a surprised little sound, Kirito and Kazuto both tended to be standoffish and such a blatant display of physical affection was rare. That's not to say she didn't like it, she simply leaned into him and closed her eyes.

"HEY GUYS WHAT'S UP!" Klein yelled from about three centimeters in front of their faces. They both jumped up a few meters and scooted to opposite side of the bench, faces blushed and heads down.

"Mommy and Daddy are talking about summer camp!" The still-present Yui said from her small projector in the middle of the bench.

"Oh, hey Yui-chan, so you can come to our world now?" Klein asked, squatting down to be face to face with small hologram.

"Yea, Mommy's old friend gave this cool holographomajigger to us!" Yui replied cheerfully.

"Cool, glad to see you here." Klein said before standing back up. "So what summer camp?"

"It's this cool military camp down in the islands!" Yui interjected for her 'parents', still trying to recover from their embarrassment attack, "Mommy's old friend runs it and we think it might cheer Daddy up!"

"A military camp, eh, what island?"

"O-ki-na-wa!"

"I hear they got some nice beaches down there." Klein said, thinking, "Mind if I come along?"

"Yea, sure," Asuna said, "we were going to invite everyone else of Ki… Kazuto said yes."

"Well from what I saw earlier I take it that he did?" Klein asked with a sly grin. Both Asuna and Kazuto were reduced red-faced blabbering once more but Yui picked up the question without hesitation.

"Yep!"

"Uhh… I never really…" Kazuto began.

"Oh, come on Daddy, we all know that was a yes." Yui interrupted.

"Oh, ok, fine, I'll go, I guess we should go talk to the others." Kazuto said, standing up, the blush fading form his face. Asuna picked up Yui's projector and clipped it onto her shoulder bag before standing up herself.

"I think I saw them in the cafeteria." Klein said, "Probably talking about Kazuto here." He patted the dark haired boy in question on the shoulder as his face heated up once more. Any color drained from Asuna's face as she stalked away.

"Thanks Klein, now she's not going to talk to me for a week."

"Ahhh, it'll be ok."

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**YEA! MY FIRST CROSSOVER1!**

**Reviews please!**

**Standard disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing in this story, it is a FANFICTION**

**Stuff will heat up pretty quickly later (action wise, although there might be some romantic tension.)**


	2. Games and Monsters

Dragons and Eagles

Chapter 2

Games and Monsters

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**OK, I know Kirito and the SAO characters don't live in Tokyo, but I got a thousand words in before I figured that out, just role with it.**

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Rukia tugged on the sleeve of her uniform jacket. The dress uniforms both she and Ichigo had received in the mail a few days before were hot and stifling, not to mention tight. She hated tight clothes. This modern fad of shape-hugging garments had seemingly permeated the military as well; the last time she had had any dealing with the military had been in 1877 and the samurais she had met then had worn robes similar to her own. The uniform she continued to gripe about in her head consisted of navy blue trousers with red stripes running up the sides, a dark blue jacket with brass buttons and red trimmings, and a white peaked cap with a black bill. She was supposed to be wearing a pair of white gloves as well but she would scream of she put on another piece of clothing. She started to grumble under her breath.

"What?" Ichigo asked from the seat behind her, he was wearing the same uniform, plus the gloves.

"It's these damn uniforms." Rukia replied, continuing to grumble and adjust herself constantly.

"Well, you're the one that signed us up for this."

"Shut up"

She finally sighed and stopped fiddling with her uniform and squirming in her seat. If she wasn't comfortable then she probably wasn't going to be so she sucked it up. It had been twenty minutes since the old olive drab Greyhound bus had come by and picked up their group from Karakura High School. The air conditioner was far beyond its expected life span and the Tokyo summer seemed to turn the metal bus into an oven. The trip would be longer than expected because they had to go into the inner city to pick up another group going to the camp before they could proceed to Yokota AFB to catch their flight. None of these factors were designed to put her in a good mood.

Mizuiro and Keigo sat at the front of the bus, as far away from Rukia and Ichigo in the back as possible. Rukia's foul mood and Keigo's incessant approaches were not designed to mix. She regretted snapping at him because on most days she found his misguided affections amusing, but she was in no mood for it today. Orihime and Tatsumi sat in the middle of the bus, talking amiably. Orihime's uniform, like most of her clothes, barely fit, and Tatsumi almost looked like a man. Orihime kept looking back at them and Rukia held no illusions as to which one of them was drawing her attention. Human relationships, especially the ones where one was completely oblivious of the other were highly entertaining, even after fifteen decades. Chad sat two seats in front of them and took up an entire seat row that could normally hold two people, but his uniform fit him exceptionally well.

Although her denreishinki had been upgraded to look like a modern smartphone, it didn't have many of its auxiliary functions, so for the rest of the bus ride, while the rest of her 'classmates' were listening to music, playing games, or talking to their friends, she was stuck in the back of the bus, broiling, with her strawberry-headed companion whose idea of friendly conversation was silence. After about ten minutes of stewing in her agony, the airbrakes on the bus sounded and the ancient Greyhound came to a stop. Rukia opened her eyes as the doors up front opened with a squeak to allow the other group on the bus. The first one on was dark haired boy, maybe seventeen or eighteen, who seemed friendly enough. Behind him was a tall orange-haired (Although not as orange as Ichigo's) girl and a tall brown haired boy, both of whom had smiles plastered on their faces. They appeared to be about the same age as the dark haired boy. Last on was a pair of almost painfully normal girls, one of them looked to be about her own assumed age of fifteen and the other almost looked like a primary schooler, although she could have passed as a second year middle schooler. Maybe. All of them seemed happy and normal enough, but Rukia's experience noticed a deep abyss behind their eyes that she rarely saw outside of carrier soldiers and first responders.

* * *

Kazuto was the first on the bus when it arrived at the SAO remedial school. The uniforms they had all received seemed hot, but he didn't mind. He always seemed cold these days anyways. The bus driver gave them a curt nod before Kazuto passed him on his way to his seat. He picked one in the back of the bus, across from a dark haired girl who may or may not have been having a heat stroke. Asuna was behind him and sat down next to him, between him and miss heat stroke. Although she had fussed for hours over her hair, she never quite got the bun under her cap quite right and a few strands still fell in her face. To be honest Kazuto thought it was cute, but she absolutely hated it and was still a little frustrated. Klein was right behind her and sat across from a very large man that Kazuto had a hard time believing was in high school. Behind him came Rika and Keiko, who sat across from another pair of girls in the middle of the bus. He was about to put his earbuds in when the girl next to them spoke.

"You wouldn't happen to have any water, would you?" She asked. Asuna looked at her and blinked.

"Uh, yea, sure." She reached into her bag (She had actually found a shoulder bag that matched the uniforms) and pulled out a twenty ounce water bottle, "Here you go."

"Thanks." She said, immediately draining the bottle. "Kuchiki Rukia."

"Yuuki Asuna."

And so the two girls struck up a conversation with an ease that frankly astounded Kazuto. He shook his head and put his earbuds in, playing soft, haunting music. He probably wouldn't be able to get an internet connection in flight, so he popped his laptop and looked over his feed. Nothing particularly new was happening in the gaming world, so he switched over to real-world.

* * *

**19 July 2025 **Last updated at 16:23 GMT

**Blackout! : China goes underground**

Earlier today, at 05:00 local time, in what seemed to be a coordinated effort, all media traffic in and out of the People's Republic of China was inexplicably halted. Chinese-based web servers went down and even the infamous Seed VRMMO servers came offline. Passenger flights heading into China were intercepted by fighters of the People's Liberation Army Air Force and forced to turn around and leave Chinese airspace. Several flights ran out of fuel and were forced to crash land in areas such as Afghanistan, Kazakhstan and Siberia.

Intelligence services in Washington and London have released reports urging the public not to panic, that the PRC is simply conducting a nationwide emergency response exercise. Moscow and Tel Aviv, however, have released cryptic reports indicating that this may not be an exercise. Nothing solid or confirmed has come out of any government agency.

The most popular theory amongst internet users so far, not surprisingly, is that the zombie apocalypse had begun in the country. Several major political theorists have speculated that such theories may not be far off, citing infectious disease and rampant radiation as probable causes for China's current behavior. Some less popular theories indicate internal strife such as a rebellion or a military coup...

* * *

The bus lurched to a stop. Kazuto looked up and closed his laptop instinctively. Around him the conversation had stopped as the bus doors opened and an American airman stepped on and checked the driver's ID card. Kazuto reached into his bag and drew the papers that had been included with the uniform that should allow him onto the base. He looked out the window and was surprised to see a number of men in full gear, including automatic weapons. He had passed by the base a number of times and he had never seen the guards out in such force. Everything went smoothly until the airman got to Kuchiki-san sitting across from him and Asuna.

"Papers, please." He asked in English. Kuchiki simply stared at him amicably and nodded. Asuna looked back and forth between the two for a moment before speaking.

"Um, Kuchiki-san, he's asking for your papers." She made a little oh and reached into her own bag to retrieve her papers before handing them to the guard with a slightly embarrassed look. Kazuto got the impression that there was more rage than embarrassment behind the façade. The guard left the bus and the bus started moving again before Kuchiki turned around in her seat.

"Hey, Ichigo." She said. He pulled out one of his earphones.

"What is i-" he got out before Kuchiki put two fingers to his temple and his eyes rolled back in his head. It was only half a second before she pulled her hand back and his eyes came back down with a wet cough. It took him a few moments to recover.

"Ah, that's better." Kuchiki said, this time in English. Asuna just coughed herself and turned to her own smartphone with a look that implied that she didn't want to know what had just happened.

"Warn me next time you're going to do that, OK?" The orange-haired boy she had called 'the strawberry' asked.

"You're a big boy, you can take a surprise here and there" She replied.

Kazuto didn't really want to know what happened either, so he put his earbuds in and packed everything into his back pack before the bus pulled up on the tarmac. He looked out the window at the plane that would take them south. It really wasn't much to look at, just a grey winged tube with some engines and a tail. Klein seemed none the less impressed.

"Wow… a C-130… these babies are in every modern war-type game out there, but I've never actually seen a real one before." He seemed awestruck, along with the brown-haired boy at the front of the bus, by the overly average and unassuming plane. Kazuto simply shrugged and took out his earbuds as someone stepped onto the bus.

"You're the summer camp guys, right?" He asked. He wore an olive drab flight suit and a helmet that gave his head a bulbous appearance. He spoke with a thick accent that Kazuto had a hard time understanding, his chewing gum didn't help either.

"Yes, sir." The black-haired boy in the front seat replied.

"Well we're your ride. Get on the plane, buckle into the seats, and stay there. We don't have enough time to be babysitting a bunch of wanna be jarheads." He said curtly before stepping off the bus. Kazuto and Asuna exchanged a look before shrugging and standing up and shuffling off the bus themselves with the rest of the group. On the tarmac were ten large green bags waiting for them. They were each stenciled with the owner's name and a 3-2-4 digit number. Rika and Keiko seemed the struggle with the large bags but the even larger man came over and effortlessly slung them over his shoulder. They nodded a hesitant thanks and he returned it before heading off to the plane. Kazuto and Asuna headed off to the plane as well, finding it to be quite cramped. To rows of seats lined the walls of the plane, facing one another.

"Clip your sea bags to the rings in the floor, buckle up, and keep a tight hold on anything you got, it's going to be a bumpy ride." Came the call from the helmeted man that had met them on the bus, now sitting in a seat at the front of the cargo bay, "Now! Wheels up in five."

Kazuto and Asuna hustled to two seats on the right side of the plane. The large man was already seated on the other side. Kazuto looked at his 'sea bag' and found a cloth ring with a d-clip attached and secured it to the ring in the floor directly in front of his seat. The Ichigo boy from the bus came on next and sat next to Kazuto, with Kuchiki on his other side. Once he had his stuff secured he turned to Kazuto.

"Kurosaki Ichigo." He said reaching out his hand.

"Kirigaya Kazuto." He said, taking it.

"You get shanghaied into this to?" Kurosaki asked. Kazuto gave him a wry smile.

"Yea, something like that, Kurosaki-san." Asuna gave him an annoyed look before looking away and putting her earbuds in.

"Please, call me Ichigo. So why are you here?"

"I… had some problems. My physical rehabilitation hasn't been going quite as well as I'd hope. And you?"

"Rukia over here says I'm too naïve." Kuchiki put on a mischievous smile and closed her eyes, propping her feet up on her bag and chewing a piece of gum. Once the rest of the group had filed onto the plane the ramp closed up and the winged tube lurched forward to an uncertain future.

* * *

**OK, so these guys are going to be put in fireteams that will more or less determine how relationships form across the story. Here are the propositions:**

**Fireteam 1: Rukia, Ichigo, Kazuto, Asuna**

**Fireteam 2: Klein, Chad, Keigo, Mizuiro**

**Fireteam 3: Tatsumi, Orihime, Keiko, Rika**

**I'm up for any suggested changes.**

**Reviews please.**

**I had the news article all done up like a BBC internet article but the site didn't transfer it over.**


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